Webb Deane Stevens Museum

The Curious Case of Silas Deane
2023-09-21 18:00 - 20:00 (America/New_York) | WDS Museum, 211 Main Street, Wethersfield, CT, 06109
You’ve heard the story of the Founding Fathers and the American Revolution time and again, but what do you know about Wethersfield’s Silas Deane? For more than two centuries, Deane’s reputation has been clouded by allegations of malfeasance and profiteering at the expense of the Continental Congress. Many called him a traitor. But what if everything you think you know about Silas Deane is wrong? This fascinating discussion, led by Dr. Susan Holly, Senior Historian with the U.S. Department of State’s Office of the Historian, will dispel the mystery. Dr. Holly’s presentation will be followed by an open discussion moderated by State Historian Emeritus and Webb Deane Stevens Museum Scholar-in-Residence Dr. Walter W. Woodward.
Reception: 5:30 pm / Program: 6-8 pm. Get tickets here. The program will be held in the Webb Barn, located at the rear of the Museum campus.
The Curious Case of Silas Deane is underwritten by the U.S. Department of State and The Society of the Cincinnati in the State of Connecticut.
About Dr. Susan Holly
Dr. Susan Holly is a senior historian with the United States Department of State’s Office of the Historian and has been researching the origins of early American diplomacy for a new documentary compilation scheduled for release in 2026. She previously served as executive producer for a DVD and curriculum series on various topics in diplomacy for high school audiences, wrote a short history of U.S.-China relations and other materials for the opening of the new U.S. Embassy in Beijing, compiled volumes on Global Issues and a retrospective history on the Eisenhower era coup in Guatemala for the Foreign Relations of the United States. Before joining the office, she served in the Bureau of Public Affairs as an editor, speechwriter, and Department spokesperson for several international delegations.
Dr. Holly earned degrees in history and journalism from Marquette University, followed by a M.A. and Ph.D. from the University of Essex in the United Kingdom. Other publications include a book on the Iran-Iraq War for Lloyd’s of London Press, as well as numerous newspaper articles. Her resume also includes participation in an elephant race, where she learned elephants could run fast.

The Witch in Old Connecticut: Righting a Troublesome Legacy
2023-10-05 18:30 - 20:00 | WDS Museum, 211 Main Street, Wethersfield, CT, 06109
THANK YOU FOR YOUR INTEREST IN THIS EVENT. IT IS NOW SOLD OUT.
The Witch in Old Connecticut: Righting a Troublesome Legacy will touch upon Dr. Richard S. Ross III’s book Before Salem: Witch Hunting in the Connecticut River Valley 1647-1663. Dr. Ross will also discuss his additional research and the contemporary events affecting the historical legacy of the witch panic in the Connecticut and New Haven colonies.
Reception: 6 p.m./ Program: 6:30 – 8:00 p.m.
About Dr. Richard S. Ross III
Dr. Richard S. Ross is Professor Emeritus and former College Librarian at Trinity College, Hartford Connecticut. He holds an MA from Northeastern University, an MLS from Simmons College, and a PhD from Boston College. He has taught at Boston College, Northeastern University, the University of New Hampshire, and Trinity College. He has held administrative Librarian positions at Northeastern University, the University of Massachusetts at Lowell, the University of New Hampshire, and Georgetown University.
Dr. Ross has given talks throughout Connecticut for various organizations, particularly libraries and historical association on Before Salem: Witch Hunting in the Connecticut River Valley 1647-1663, his second published book. His first book was the well-reviewed Contagion in Prussia, 1831 the Cholera Epidemic and the Threat of the Polish Uprising. Dr. Ross recently wrote a brochure based on original research for the Ancient Burying Ground Association in Hartford entitled, Connecticut Colony Seventeenth-Century Witch Panic: A Guide to Connected Persons Interred in Hartford’s Ancient Burying Ground 2022. Additionally, he has a third book in press: Body Snatching in Nineteenth Century New England and the Nation’s Capital, a Social History.

The Alchemy of Justice: John Winthrop, Jr., and New England’s Other Witch: Presented by Walt Woodward
2023-10-26 18:30 - 20:00 | WDS Museum, 211 Main Street, Wethersfield, CT, 06109
THIS EVENT IS SOLD OUT. THANK YOU FOR YOUR INTEREST.
Before Salem, Connecticut colony was New England’s most aggressive prosecutor of witches. That was before John Winthrop Jr., renowned alchemist, and himself an occult practitioner, became involved in the colony’s witchcraft cases. His careful – but forceful – intervention in the case of Wethersfield’s Katherine Harrison transformed Connecticut from New England’s most aggressive killer of witches to a colony that ended witchcraft executions a generation before Salem.
Reception: 6 pm / Program: 6:30 – 8:00 pm.
About Walt Woodward
Walt Woodward is the Connecticut State Historian Emeritus and an Associate Professor of Early American History at the University of Connecticut. He teaches American Environmental History, Public History, and an honors American Studies course focused on the Connecticut River, as well as courses in Connecticut history. He is the author of Prospero’s America: John Winthrop, Jr., Alchemy and the Creation of New England Culture, numerous articles on New England history, and is a regular columnist for Connecticut Explored magazine. A former hit country music songwriter and performer, Woodward’s knowledge, sense of humor, and richly illustrated PowerPoint presentations have made him one of New England’s most sought-after public lecturers.

Expansion and Inspiration: Recent Acquisitions to the Winterthur Collection
2024-04-17 18:30 - 20:00 | WDS Museum, 211 Main Street, Wethersfield, CT, 06109
Alexandra Deutsch, John L. and Marjorie P. McGraw Director of Collections at the Winterthur Museum, Garden & Library, will speak about recent acquisitions and the ways in which collecting there has evolved while remaining anchored in Henry Francis du Pont’s legacy. Alexandra oversees the mansion’s 175 museum rooms and adjacent galleries, along with the world’s largest and most celebrated collection of American decorative arts.
Join us at 6 p.m. for a complimentary reception. The program will begin at 6:30 p.m.
NSCDA-CT and Museum Members: $15 / General Public: $20. Register HERE.
About the Presenter:
Alexandra Deutsch, a graduate of Vassar College and the Winterthur Program in American Material Culture, is the John L. and Marjorie P. McGraw Director of Collections at the Winterthur Museum. She leads Winterthur’s Collections and Interpretation Division. Prior to arriving at Winterthur in 2019, she was Vice-President of Collections and Interpretation and Chief Curator at the Maryland Center for History and Culture, formerly the Maryland Historical Society.
Her tenure at the Maryland Center for History and Culture was distinguished by nationally recognized exhibitions that included In Full Glory Reflected: Maryland and the War of 1812, Woman of Two Worlds: Elizabeth Patterson Bonaparte and Her Quest for an Imperial Legacy, and Spectrum of Fashion. From 2010 until 2019, she worked to establish the Fashion Archives, now named the Barbara P. Katz Fashion Archives at the Maryland Center for History and Culture. Since arriving at Winterthur, she has spearheaded a re-envisioning of the museum’s gallery building and led multiple exhibitions, including Outside In: Nature-inspired Design at Winterthur (2020), Jacqueline Kennedy and Henry Francis du Pont: From Winterthur to the White House (2022), Ann Lowe, American Couturier (2023) and is currently curating a major reinstallation of the permanent collections on view in Winterthur’s galleries.
Her publications include Ann Lowe, American Couturier (2023), Spectrum of Fashion (2019), Structure and Perspective: David Brewster Explores Maryland’s Social Landscape (2017) and Woman of Two Worlds: Elizabeth Patterson Bonaparte (2016). She has written and lectured about diverse topics in American material culture throughout her career with a particular emphasis on women’s and fashion history.

The Landscape of Future History
2024-04-25 18:30 - 20:00 | WDS Museum, 211 Main Street, Wethersfield, CT, 06109
The Webb Deane Stevens Museum is pleased to present landscape architect David Rubin in conversation with Executive Director Brenton Grom. Mr. Rubin, the founding principal of DAVID RUBIN Land Collective, joins us in advance of receiving the Elvira Broome Doolan Medal from the Garden Club of America at its annual meeting in Hartford. His remarks will explore the firm’s ethos of “empathy-driven design,” followed by a fireside chat with Mr. Grom about their recent collaboration at the George Read II House & Gardens in Old New Castle, Delaware, which resulted in a new design for the landscape that will unite many layers of history while serving as a gathering place for the community that helped shape the plan.
DAVID RUBIN Land Collective practices landscape architecture from a mission of empathy, problem solving on behalf of their clients, and empowering constituencies through accessibility (which they define as an “invitation to participate”). Because of their belief that landscapes are written to be read, they strive to manage change in historic landscapes rather than to preserve them wholesale. They “lift the bell jar” off of historic sites in an effort to ensure that contemporary society can access and value what has come before, allowing these public treasures to be loved and understood by the 21st century.
Please join us for a complimentary reception at 6 p.m. The program will begin at 6:30 p.m.
NSCDA-CT and Museum Members: $20 / General Public: $25. Register HERE.
About the Presenter:
David A. Rubin, PLA, FASLA, FAAR is the founding principal of DAVID RUBIN Land Collective, a landscape architecture, urban design, and planning studio committed to practicing with an emphasis on socially purposeful design strategies. David’s visionary contribution to the field in “empathy-driven design” is a hallmark of the studio, earning increasing renown for fusing issues of social justice in cities with excellence in the design of public spaces. Educated at Connecticut College and Harvard University, he has taught and lectured at a number of institutions, including Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design, the University of Pennsylvania School of Design, Louisiana State University, and Southern California Institute of Architecture. David is a Fellow of the American Academy in Rome, a Fellow of the American Society of Landscape Architects, and recipient of the 2024 Elvira Broome Doolan medal which recognizes innovative work in landscape architecture with emphasis on city planning and civic improvement in urban areas. He was appointed by the U.S. State Department to serve on their Industry Advisory Group (IAG) to promote best practices in landscape architecture in Overseas Building Operations (OBO). His projects have received awards and honors from the American Society of Landscape Architects, the Society of College and University Planners, and the American Institute of Architects, among others.
David’s current work includes Grand Junction Park in Westfield, IN, a socially-purposeful, environmentally-resilient, and inclusive park focused on human engagement; the National World War I Memorial, new comfort stations throughout the National Mall and the Tidal Basin Master Plan; Franklin Park, and an expanse of riverfront along the Anacostia in Washington, D.C.; multiple projects for the Fort Wayne Riverfront in Indiana; and a new plaza for Temple University in Philadelphia. His studio’s work includes diverse typologies in locations from Los Angeles to Rome, Berlin, Cape Town, New York City, Washington, D.C., Detroit, Indianapolis, Fort Wayne, Pittsburgh, and Philadelphia.

LECTURE | Other People's Stuff: How the Spectacle of House Museums Can Bring Us Together and Teach Us Empathy
2024-09-12 18:00 - 20:00 | WDS Museum, 211 Main Street, Wethersfield, CT, 06109
You don’t have to believe the country is falling apart to notice Americans struggling to come together. Last year the U.S. Surgeon General issued an advisory report on our “epidemic of loneliness,” a dark flip side to the loud and impassioned public dialogue that has become a hallmark of 21st-century life. Meanwhile, we give less than ever to charity, belong to fewer organizations, and distance ourselves from the categories and etiquette that once defined individuals’ relationships to a larger community. We want to be seen and heard, and yet we sometimes lack the tools and patience to see and hear one another.
From the neuroscience of spatial experience to the awe inspired by thinking across expanses of time, house museums hold powerful means to opening our minds. If we treat them as laboratories rather than as repositories of information, they can teach us to look closely at the residue of the past and use multiple kinds of intelligence to grasp the complexity of the human relationships intertwined with it. A century ago, old rooms and their furnishings were part of a bold new strategy in museums to lift up society by drawing attention to the objects that surround us. This lecture, adapted from an address last winter at the Colonial Williamsburg Antiques Forum, focuses on the ways in which our national treasures in Historic Wethersfield can help us observe, listen, and relate to one another with the same curiosity and respect we accord to people of the past.

The Loyalist Legacy: Martha Codman Karolik's Ancestry, Collecting, and Nationalism
2025-01-15 18:30 - 20:00 | WDS Museum, 211 Main Street, Wethersfield, CT, 06109
Discover how one prominent New England woman’s look at her family history was entangled with gender, nationalism, race, memory, and the Colonial Revival. Historian MaryKate Smolenski examines how and why loyalism to the Crown, which divided families and communities during the American Revolution, was edited out of the picture in the 1920s.
Martha Codman Karolik (1858-1948) is best known for her and her husband’s significant donations to the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Prior to her marriage, Codman’s early collecting focused on her ancestors; she was deeply interested in her family history and also joined lineage-based societies, including NSCDA. Codman was intrigued by one particular ancestor: Katherine Greene Amory (1731-1777), a Revolutionary-era loyalist from Boston. Codman owned several Amory objects, including portraits by John Singleton Copley. In 1923, Martha published Amory’s journal, but deliberately edited the publication to create a family narrative that omitted loyalism.
Codman left a legacy, through print and material culture, that misrepresents the complexity of the Revolution, but also reflected Martha’s twentieth-century interests. Martha’s story, and the one she told about her family, is entangled in the history of gender, nationalism, race, the Colonial Revival, and memory. Examining Codman’s narrative reveals how our understanding of eighteenth-century history and artifacts were shaped by later eras.
BIO
MaryKate Smolenski is a PhD candidate in American Studies at Boston University. She studies the memory of the American Revolution through print and material culture, and is particularly interested in how descendants of Revolutionary-era loyalists remember their ancestors. Smolenski has previously worked with several museums and historical societies, including the Newport Historical Society, History Cambridge, and the GWU Museum and Textile Museum. Prior to starting her PhD, she completed a two-year fellowship at the Preservation Society of Newport County where she re-interpreted an eighteenth-century historic house museum, Hunter House.

VIRTUAL LECTURE: 6:30 pm
Join us from the comfort of your home. This is a VIRTUAL event. Registrants will receive a Zoom link prior to the event.

This program is part of Common Ground in a Fractured Nation: Dialogues on the Past and Future of American Democracy, a new series that uses Historic Wethersfield’s distinctive colonial past to help people see and empathize with one another as we approach America’s 250th anniversary.

VIRTUAL BOOK TALK | Julia Morgan: An Intimate Biography of the Trailblazing Architect with author Victoria Kastner
2025-03-13 18:00 - 20:00 | Zoom, Virtual Event, Zoom link provided
VIRTUAL LECTURE: Join us from the comfort of your home. This is a VIRTUAL event. Registrants will receive a Zoom link prior to the event.
This event is part of our Book Talk series, where we hear from acclaimed authors who discuss their books in their own words. Get a glimpse into their work and process, and stick around for a lively Q&A.
Victoria Kastner, former Hearst Castle historian and acclaimed author, probes the remarkable life of Julia Morgan – the first woman admitted to Paris’s prestigious École des Beaux-Arts and California’s first licensed female architect. Drawing from her groundbreaking new biography, Kastner reveals the extraordinary woman behind 700 architectural masterpieces, including the legendary Hearst Castle, and paints an intimate portrait of one of America’s most prolific architects.
Join us for an illuminating talk as Kastner shares how she drew upon previously unpublished interviews, letters, and Morgan’s personal diaries to weave a captivating tale about courage, vision, and resilience that reveals in fascinating detail how Morgan’s friendship with William Randolph Hearst, struggles with familial dementia, and devotion to architecture changed the California coast, and the field of architecture itself.
Tickets: $15 General | $10 Book Club and Museum Members | $5 Students
https://www.simpletix.com/e/virtual-book-talk-julia-morgan-an-intimate-tickets-206516
Victoria Kastner served as the official historian for Hearst Castle in San Simeon, California for over 30 years. She has authored several definitive books about the castle, including “Hearst Castle: The Biography of a Country House” and “Julia Morgan: An Intimate Biography of the Trailblazing Architect.” Her work combines meticulous historical research with architectural and social history analysis, drawing on her unprecedented access to original documents and architectural plans during her tenure. In addition to her scholarly pursuits, Kastner is a former commercial baker and a longtime vocalist. Her current research interests have expanded to include the musical compositions and singing career of Fred Astaire.

JOIN BOOK CLUB | This program is part of the WDS Book Club Book Talk series. If you would like to join our Book Club, you can sign up here: https://www.simpletix.com/e/wds-book-club-tickets-201691

GARDEN TALK | Waking Up Your Garden from Winter with Peter Winne
2025-03-27 18:30 - 20:00 | WDS Museum, 211 Main Street, Wethersfield, CT, 06109
Learn how to thoughtfully and properly wake up your garden from winter and set yourself up for a season of beautiful and healthy blooms. Join WDS Head Gardener Peter Winne for a colorful conversation on how to treat your garden with care to prepare it for the coming Spring. Weather permitting, the talk will end with a short hands-on pruning demonstration outside in the Amy Cogswell Garden.
Peter Winne | Hartford-based horticulturist Peter Winne designs and cares for gardens in public parks and on unique and historic residential properties in Connecticut and New York. He is Head Gardener for the Amy Cogswell Colonial Revival Garden at the Webb Deane Stevens Museum. He founded Peter Winne Gardens in 2021 after four years as Head Gardener at Elizabeth Park, home of the nation’s oldest public rose garden. Pete apprenticed under rosarian Stephen Scanniello, curator of the Peggy Rockefeller Rose Garden at New York Botanical Garden and has received additional mentoring from Michael Shoup of the Antique Rose Emporium in Brenham, Texas and Gregg Lowery of The Friends of Vintage Roses in Sebastopol, California. He holds a BA in Urban Planning from Vassar College, an MA from the Gallatin School at NYU, and a Landscape Design Certificate from Naugatuck Valley Community College. Prior to going into horticulture full-time, he performed in the US and Europe as a touring bluegrass musician. He currently lives in his hometown of Hartford where he still occasionally performs.
Tickets: $20 | $15 Members
https://www.simpletix.com/e/garden-talk-waking-up-your-garden-from-win-tickets-206531

VIRTUAL LECTURE | Victorian-Era Colonial Revival: Late 19th Century Furniture of New York Cabinetmakers Matthew Meier & Ernest Hagen
2025-05-22 19:00 - 20:00 | WDS Museum, 211 Main Street, Wethersfield, CT, 06109
VIRTUAL LECTURE
Join us for an exclusive virtual lecture* with Grant S. Quertermous, Curator & Director of Collections at the Richard Hampton Jenrette Foundation, as he delves into the history and craftsmanship of a remarkable 1892 Meier & Hagen mirror from the Webb Deane Stevens Museum’s collection, and the evolution of Meier & Hagen furniture.
The mirror was produced by Meier & Hagen in 1892 and is on display in our new exhibition: Out of The Attic: A Century of Collecting.
Thursday May 22nd, 7:00 pm
Members: $10
Non-Members: $15
*Zoom link will be provided in advance of the lecture.
Grant Quertermous | Grant Quertermous is the Curator and Director of Collections for the Richard Hampton Jenrette Foundation (formerly Classical American Homes Preservation Trust), a position he has held since 2020. He previously served as Curator at Tudor Place Historic House and Garden, a National Historic Landmark in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C. for five years and prior to that he was the Assistant Curator at James Madison’s Montpelier for nine years during its major restoration and furnishing project. He holds an undergraduate degree in history from Murray State University and a Master’s Degree in Anthropology from the University of South Carolina. His book, A Georgetown Life, the Reminiscences of Britannia Wellington Peter Kennon of Tudor Place was published by Georgetown University Press in 2020.

This lecture is generously supported by the Richard Hampton Jenrette Foundation.

LECTURE | Out of the Attic: Inventing Antiques in Twentieth-Century New England
2025-08-14 19:00 - 20:30 | WDS Museum, 211 Main Street, Wethersfield, CT, 06109
LECTURE
What transforms a discarded object into a treasured antique? Join acclaimed historian and independent scholar Briann Greenfield as she reveals how Connecticut and New England didn’t just collect antiques—they invented the very idea of what makes something “antique.” Through a century of transformation, she traces how everyday objects evolved from dusty attic finds to coveted museum pieces. Greenfield uncovers the fascinating stories of collectors, dealers, and curators who shaped American material culture, showing how personal passion and cultural values created the antique market we know today.
*This event is available in person and via Zoom.
In-person at 211 Main Street, Wethersfield, CT or on Zoom. Zoom details will be shared via email in advance of the lecture.
Tickets: $15 | $10 Members

SPECIAL EVENT | Scott Allan: An Evening of Spirit Messages
2025-10-02 18:30 - 20:30 | WDS Museum, 211 Main Street, Wethersfield, CT, 06109
An evening of Spirit Messages with Scott Allan
Thursday, October 2, 6-8:30 pm
Join us in the Webb Barn to look through the veil and receive messages from the other side. Scott Allan has seen grief from both sides. As a funeral director, he helped families say goodbye. Now as an evidential medium featured on “Dark Echoes,” he helps them reconnect. Expect real stories, authentic moments, and unexpected humor that makes the evening both moving and surprisingly enjoyable.
What’s Included:
Mediumship Demonstration: Scott brings through heartfelt, evidential messages from loved ones in Spirit.
Book Signing & Sale: Pick up a signed copy of In the Presence of Light (with a foreword by Joseph P. Shiel III).
VIP Meet & Greet/Q&A: VIP guests enjoy an exclusive post-event Q&A and time to connect personally with Scott.
Door Prizes & Surprises: A little extra magic for lucky guests!
Tickets:
General Admission: $40 (includes event and book signing)
Members: $35 (includes event and book signing)
VIP Experience: $60 (includes upfront priority seating at the event, book signing, and exclusive post-event Q&A with Scott with special VIP Door Prizes! (Hint… someone will win a free reading!)
Please Note:
Not everyone is guaranteed a personal reading, but Scott aims to deliver as many messages as possible.
Event is for ages 16+.
Doors open at 6:30 PM; seating is first-come, first-served (except for VIP upfront priority seating).

VIRTUAL LECTURE | The Ruin of All Witches: Fear, Fury & False Accusations With Dr. Malcolm Gaskill
2025-10-23 12:00 - 13:30 | Zoom, Virtual Event, Zoom link provided
VIRTUAL LECTURE | The Ruin of All Witches: Fear, Fury & False Accusations With Dr. Malcolm Gaskill
Thursday, October 23, 12 pm
This is a virtual lecture. Zoom link will be provided in advance of the event.
WDS Director of Preservation & Collections TR Hamilton and distinguished historian Dr. Malcolm Gaskill moderate a group discussion looking at the process through which Dr. Gaskill came to write his 2022 work “A Ruin of All Witches: Life and Death in the New World”. Gaskill’s work utilizes previously unexplored sources to examine 17th-century New England witchcraft trials through the lens of one specific Connecticut River Valley community in 1651. Attendees are encouraged to participate and come ready with questions.
Tickets: Members $10 | General Admission $15 | Book Club Members Free

Bio | Malcolm Gaskill is Emeritus Professor of Early Modern History at the University of East Anglia, specializing in the social and cultural history of 17th-century England and America, particularly the history of witchcraft.
He is the author of six books, including Between Two Worlds: How the English Became Americans, Witchfinders: A Seventeenth-Century English Tragedy and Hellish Nell: Last of Britain’s Witches, a biography of the spiritualist medium Helen Duncan, the last woman imprisoned under the Witchcraft Act in 1944.
His most recent book is The Ruin of all Witches: Life and Death in the New World, the story of a witch-panic in a New England frontier town, published by Penguin, Allen Lane.
He is also interested in war and memory in the twentieth century, about which he has written about for the TLS and London Review of Books. This is also a key theme of Hellish Nell, a revised edition of which is underway.

LECTURE | Coming Home: The Story of a Tulip and Sunflower Chest With Pat Kane
2025-11-20 19:00 | CT
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Renowned decorative arts scholar Pat Kane reveals the remarkable story of Connecticut’s Wethersfield chest tradition in this specialized lecture. Explore the intersection of artistry, craftsmanship, and cultural identity through these colonial masterpieces that represent some of America’s finest early furniture making. Kane’s expertise illuminates how these functional objects reflect broader patterns of settlement, trade, and artistic expression in the Connecticut River Valley, making them invaluable windows into colonial American life and
aesthetics.
Tickets: General Admission $15| Members $10 | Jenrette Society & Students $5
Bio | Patricia E. Kane, Friends of American Arts Curator of American Decorative Arts at the Yale University Art Gallery, has been at Yale since receiving her M.A. from the University of Delaware, Winterthur Program in Early American Culture in 1968. The topic of her Master’s thesis was the seventeenth-century joined furniture of Hartford County. She received her Ph.D. in art history from Yale in 1987. She oversees collections of American decorative arts and design that range from the seventeenth century to the present. Since 2002 she has directed the Rhode Island Furniture Archive at the Yale University Art Gallery that documents furniture making in Rhode Island from 1650 to 1830. The results of this research are disseminated through a website, https://americandecorativearts.yale.edu/ , hosted by Jstor, and Art and Industry in Early America: Rhode Island Furniture 1650–1830, a publication for a 2016 exhibition at the Art Gallery. In addition to ongoing research on early Rhode Island furniture, she has collaborated with scientists at Yale to identify the different species of mahogany used in early American furniture.

LECTURE | Beyond Blue and White: The Hidden Women of Delftware
2026-03-12 19:00 - 21:00 | WDS Museum, 211 Main Street, Wethersfield, CT, 06109
Beyond Blue and White: The Hidden Women of Delftware
WDS Book Talk with Genevieve Wheeler Brown
Thursday, March 12, 7:00 PM
This lecture is offered in person and via ZOOM. Please purchase virtual tickets prior to 4:00 PM on the day of the lecture to ensure you receive the link.
Purchase Tickets

When over seventy-five pieces of rare Delftware were discovered in a historic Manhattan townhouse, decorative art expert Genevieve Wheeler Brown recognized these exquisite ceramics held secrets overlooked for centuries. Join us for an illustrated journey through the hidden history of this beloved art form and the remarkable women who shaped it.
Through vivid images of 17th and 18th century treasures—puzzle jugs, flower pyramids, Persian blue teapots, and ornate tiles—Brown reveals the stories of female factory owners like Barbara Rotteveel, who founded “The Three Bells” in 1671, and royal patron Queen Mary II, whose passion for blue and white ceramics sparked a decorative revolution. Discover how pioneering American collectors Mrs. J. Pierpont Morgan and Mrs. Cornelius Vanderbilt II laid the groundwork for women in museums while preserving decorative arts for future generations.
Part art history, part detective story, this presentation celebrates the artistry and forceful female lives behind one of the world’s most coveted ceramics.
Tickets: $15 | $12.50 Virtual | $10 Members
This lecture will be offered in person and via Zoom.
*Zoom link will be provided in advance of the lecture.
About the Author: As a decorative art advisor and writer with over thirty years in the art world, including a decade with Christie’s in New York and London, Genevieve Wheeler Brown has been actively involved in the community of Delftware. She has also participated on the Antiques Roadshow as an appraiser with an eye out for overlooked “treasure.” In her role, she has held innumerable objects, from fake Stradivari violins to gold-mounted Faberge eggs, considering their value but also the stories they can tell. Beyond Blue and White has been named an NPR Here & Now Editors’ Pick!, The Art Newspaper‘s Book Bag Selection and recently received glowing reviews by the Magazine ANTIQUES and The Wall Street Journal.

LECTURE | America's Tapestry: Fiber Arts & The Revolution
2026-04-09 19:00 - 20:00 | WDS Museum, 211 Main Street, Wethersfield, CT, 06109
LECTURE | America’s Tapestry: Fiber Arts & The Revolution with Stefan Romero of America’s Tapestry, a collaborative community embroidery project
Thursday, April 9, 7 PM
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Join WDS and America’s Tapestry to learn about the prominent role needle art is playing in our nation’s upcoming 250th anniversary. America’s Tapestry founder and director Stefan Romero will discuss the creation of this collaborative community embroidery project, highlighting lesser-known stories from the American Revolution. Get a deep dive on everything from panel design to the stories of those who are working on bringing these incredible embroideries to life. From finding inspiration in the Scottish Borders to grassroots organizing in the United States, hear the story of how this ambitious project came to life.
Tickets: $15 |$12.50 Virtual | $10 Members
This lecture will be offered in person and via Zoom.
*Zoom link will be provided in advance of the lecture.

Stefan Romero | Director and Founder of America’s Tapestry Stefan Romero is a graduate of Carnegie Mellon University’s prestigious College of Fine Arts, where he specialized in the dress and textiles of Colonial America. As a Fulbright Scholar, Stefan deepened his understanding of the discipline through his Masters Degree at the University of Glasgow in Scotland. In collaboration with William & Mary (VA), Seton Hill University (PA), and a number of carefully selected historical and craft organizations, Stefan is creating a unique exhibition: “America’s Tapestry”. To learn more about America’s Tapestry, please visit www.americastapestry.com.

LECTURE | The Art of Collecting
2026-05-14 19:00 - 20:00 | WDS Museum, 211 Main Street, Wethersfield, CT, 06109
LECTURE | The Art of Collecting with Ned Lazaro
Thursday, May 14, 7:00 PM
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What drives someone to seek out a two-hundred-year-old sampler—and what does that impulse tell us about who we are? Join textile historian Ned Lazaro, Associate Curator of Textiles and Costumes at The Wadsworth Atheneum and former curator of textiles at Historic Deerfield for a moderated discussion on the history of collecting schoolgirl samplers and other forms of needlepoint in the United States. From early needlework to printed broadsides, discover how these rescued objects shaped our understanding of material culture—and why they still matter.
Tickets: $15 |$12.50 Virtual | $10 Members
This lecture will be offered in person and via Zoom.
*Zoom link will be provided in advance of the lecture to Members and Virtual ticket holders.

Ned Lazaro | David E. (Ned) Lazaro is the Associate Curator of Costume and Textiles at the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art in Hartford, Connecticut. He manages a collection of roughly 7,500 items, including costumes and textiles ranging from Egyptian artifacts to contemporary fashion. Lazaro specializes in interpreting fashion history, including 18th-to-20th-century deportment.

FEUDING FOUNDERS COLLECTIVE | Wethersfield Symposium: The Making of Silas Deane
2026-05-16 10:00 - 15:00 | WDS Museum, 211 Main Street, Wethersfield, CT, 06109
Walk the rooms where history unfolded. Then hear from the historians who know them best.
SCHEDULE
10:00 AM | Welcome & Orientation
10:30 AM | Tour: Webb and Deane Houses
12:00 PM | Lunch in the Webb Barn
1:00 PM | Historian Roundtable
3:00 PM | Walk to Wethersfield Cove Warehouse with the Wethersfield Historical Society
Roundtable also available via Zoom—$8

TICKETS
Full Day + Lunch: $55 | $50 Members
House Tours & Roundtable Discussion: $20 In Person | $15 Members
Virtual Roundtable Discussion: $8
Member pricing available to members of all four partner institutions.
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About the Symposium
We tend to remember the founders as marble men — monumental, unified, certain. The truth is messier and more interesting. The Feuding Founders Collective is a multi-site public history initiative that humanizes Silas Deane, John Jay, and the Lee brothers of Virginia—men who were in conversation, in collaboration, and sometimes in conflict with one another.
Meet the men behind America’s founding in this daylong exploration of Deane and his relationship to John Jay and the Lee brothers. Tour the Webb and Deane Houses, then join a roundtable featuring historians from Jay Heritage Center (NY), Menokin & Stratford Hall (VA), and the Webb Deane Stevens Museum (CT). This is the first in a three-part series across three states.
How does a man of middling origins rise to become America’s first diplomat—then plummet to disgrace? How did the Lee brothers leverage Virginia’s planter aristocracy into political influence? How did Jay’s legal prowess place him at the center of revolutionary diplomacy? This is a day for people who want the real story—not the tidy one.
Begin with a guided tour of the Webb and Deane Houses—stand in the rooms where political debates unfolded and military strategy was weighed. Share a meal in the Webb Barn. Hear from historians representing each partner institution as they build a more layered, more human portrait of Jay, the Lees, and Deane—their relationships to power and to one another. The day closes at the Wethersfield Cove Warehouse, the very waterfront where Deane built the merchant trade that launched everything.
In an era of weaponized media and public takedowns, these 250-year-old stories feel less like history and more like a mirror.

Attend All Three
Each roundtable discussion will be livestreamed on Zoom. Attend all events onsite, online, or a combination!
Webb Deane Stevens Museum | The Making of Silas Deane—May 16, Wethersfield, CT
Jay Heritage Center | John Jay, Diplomat and Spymaster—September 26, Rye, NY [Register your interest with an email to Suzanne Clary: jayheritagecenter@gmail.com]
Stratford Hall & Menokin | The Lee—Deane Conflict and the Political “Bloodbath” of 1778—November 8, Stratford, Virginia

LECTURE | Portraits of Patriots with Historian Damien Cregeau
2026-06-25 19:00 - 20:30 | CT
Purchase Tickets
LECTURE | Portraits of Patriots with Historian Damien Cregeau
Thursday, June 25 , 7:00 PM
One man painted the Revolution. Another held the Bible at Washington’s inauguration. And both have deep Connecticut roots.
Join us for Portraits of Patriots, a richly illustrated presentation tracing six extraordinary lives from the American Revolution—beginning with Colonel John Trumbull, who left the battlefield to become the young republic’s defining visual chronicler. Through Trumbull’s paintings and the work of his gifted sister Faith Trumbull Huntington, Cregeau brings an entire family into focus: soldiers, artists, and survivors bound together by war and ambition.
At the center of it all: Samuel Webb of Wethersfield. Aide-de-camp to both Generals Putnam and Washington. Veteran of Bunker Hill. The man who held the Bible as George Washington took the oath of office in 1789.

Meet the Author | Purchase a copy of Portraits of Patriots on-site and get your book personally signed.

Cash, check, Venmo and Zelle accepted.

Tickets: $15 |$12.50 Virtual | $10 Members
*This lecture will be offered in person and via Zoom. Zoom link will be provided in advance of the lecture.
Damien Cregeau | Damien Cregeau earned his B.A. in history from Hillsdale College and M.A. in history from Colorado State. He is a nationally-recognized scholar of the American Revolution who has spoken throughout the U.S. from Boston to Washington, D.C. to Chicago. He received the History Award and medal from the National Society of the Daughters of the American Revolution in 2021 in recognition of his scholarly research and many important contributions to the public’s appreciation for early American history. His talk on Alexander Hamilton is available to watch on C-SPAN. He has been published in numerous journals and magazines, including Military History Quarterly, ten features in the Journal of the American Revolution, and Financial History magazine. He published his first book, Portraits of Patriots, in 2025. He and his wife, Pam, a psychologist, own two homes in Connecticut built in 1765—the Private Samuel Hanmer House in Wethersfield and the General Jedediah Huntington House in Norwich.

LECTURE | Roots & Rhythms (New Date TBD)
2026-06-28 11:30 - 12:30 | WDS Museum, 211 Main Street, Wethersfield, CT, 06109
This event has been postponed. Contact rdumouchel@wdsmuseum.org to be notified when a new date is chosen.
Roots & Rhythms: A Garden Talk with Pete Winne Sunday, June 28 | 11:30 AM | Webb Barn
What does tending a garden have in common with playing a folk song? More than you might think. Join WDS head gardener Pete Winne for a one-of-a-kind presentation weaving together the art of horticulture and the art of musical expression—illustrated live with folk music. Part lecture, part performance, entirely unexpected.
Tickets: $15 | Children under 12 FREE
Offered in celebration of Connecticut Historic Gardens Day.
About Peter Winne | Hartford-based horticulturist Peter Winne designs and cares for gardens in public parks and on unique and historic residential properties in Connecticut and New York. He founded Peter Winne Gardens in 2021 after four years as Head Gardener at Elizabeth Park, home of the nation’s oldest public rose garden. Pete apprenticed under rosarian Stephen Scanniello, curator of the Peggy Rockefeller Rose Garden at New York Botanical Garden, and has received additional mentoring from Michael Shoup of the Antique Rose Emporium in Brenham, Texas and Gregg Lowery of The Friends of Vintage Roses in Sebastopol, California. He holds a BA in Urban Planning from Vassar College, an MA from the Gallatin School at NYU, and a Landscape Design Certificate from Naugatuck Valley Community College. Prior to going into horticulture full-time, he performed in the US and Europe as a touring bluegrass musician. He currently lives in his hometown of Hartford where he still occasionally performs.

LECTURE | Civic Stitches: Early American Needlework and National Identity
2026-09-10 18:00 - 19:30 | WDS Museum, 211 Main Street, Wethersfield, CT, 06109
LECTURE | Civic Stitches: Early American Needlework and National Identity  with Emily Whitted, Guest-Curator, American Girlhood: Needlework, Memory, and The Making of a Nation

Thursday, September 10, 6:00 PM
Purchase Tickets
This companion lecture to the exhibition American Girlhood by guest curator Emily Whitted will explore the larger history of needlework as part of early American education for girls. In the aftermath of the American Revolution, female education was a critical space for civic development, and needlework was one educational medium in which girls processed their own identities within the new nation. This lecture will connect needlework within the exhibition with pieces from other public collections, and broadly trace the rich lives of early American girls engaged in crafting a nation.
Tickets: $15 |$12.50 Virtual | $10 Members
*This lecture will be offered in person and via Zoom. Zoom link will be provided in advance of the lecture.
About the Curator | Emily Whitted is a PhD candidate at the University of Massachusetts Amherst and the guest curator of American Girlhood: Needlework, Memory, and the Making of a Nation. Her research broadly explores the history of textiles, women’s history, and material culture in early America. Her current and past work includes projects with the New Bedford Whaling Museum, the National Park Service and National Council on Public History, the Mercer Museum & Fonthill Castle, and the Porter-Phelps-Huntington Foundation. She also holds an M.A. in American Material Culture from the Winterthur Program at the University of Delaware.

FEUDING FOUNDERS COLLECTIVE | Jay Heritage Center, NY: John Jay, Diplomat and Spymaster
2026-09-26 10:00 - 15:00 | Jay Heritage Center, 210 Boston Post Road, Rye, 10580
Register your interest with an email to Suzanne Clary: jayheritagecenter@gmail.com
This event takes place at Jay Heritage Center in Rye, NY. Attend the full day in person, or purchase a virtual ticket for the roundtable discussion.
We tend to remember the founders as marble men — monumental, unified, certain. The truth is messier and more interesting. The Feuding Founders Collective is a multi-site public history initiative that humanizes Silas Deane, John Jay, and the Lee brothers of Virginia — men who were in conversation, in collaboration, and sometimes in conflict with one another.
Presented in partnership with Jay Heritage Center (NY), Friends of John Jay Homestead, and Menokin and Stratford Hall (VA), this series destabilizes the one-dimensional portraits we’ve inherited and invites audiences to sit with the full complexity of these lives: the ambition and the insecurity, the idealism and the grudges, the smear campaigns and the shared cause.
In an era of weaponized media and public takedowns, these 250-year-old stories feel less like history and more like a mirror — and understanding how the founders navigated political polarization, character assassination, and the tension between principle and self-interest may be one of the most useful things the past can offer us right now. Three sites. Three perspectives. Not a story of heroes and villains, but of imperfect people trying to build something that had never existed before.
Rye Symposium: John Jay, Diplomat and Spymaster
How did our earliest American diplomats accomplish their secret and very delicate assignments abroad? The Jay Heritage Center symposium will focus on the interactions of John Jay, Silas Deane and the Lee brothers, Arthur and William, as illustrated by the decipherable records and cyphers that they left behind. What was the Jay-Deane code and why is John Jay credited by the CIA as being the first chief of US counterintelligence? What controversy put Jay at the center of a legal defense of Deane’s actions in France? Learn firsthand about the security concerns that prompted the Lee brothers of Virginia to launch public accusations that Deane was a traitor.
This is an experience for people who want to hear our whole history. Join us and fellow history lovers for a daylong exploration of 18th century political quandaries and fragile allegiances. Stand on the very spot where Jay looked out at the horizon during the Stamp Act and imagined a new nation and his own role in shaping it. Contemplate the contradictions he faced in seeking freedom from British rule while his family denied freedom to others who worked the land. Tour the historic Jay Estate gardens followed by lunch at the same place where Jay celebrated the end of the Revolutionary War and his negotiation of the Treaty of Paris. Then hear from scholars representing each partner site as they paint a more layered, more human picture of Jay, the Lees, and Deane — their relationships to power and to one another. The program closes with a walk of the property that inspired James Fenimore Cooper’s Revolutionary War novel, “The Spy.”

10:00 AM: Welcome and Orientation (210 Boston Post Road) at Jay Mansion
10:30 AM: Jay Mansion Tour
11:00 AM: Jay Estate Gardens and Grounds Tour
12:00 PM: Lunch break on the Veranda
1:00 PM: Round Table Discussion at the Wachenheim Center
Hour long round table discussion plus Q&A.  Discussion will focus on the early lives and background of the Lee Brothers, Silas Deane and John Jay.  Each site will give a brief introduction to their founding father(s) and historic site(s).
3:00 pm: Tour of the 18th century Lyon Farmhouse exterior and archaeological area.

Attend All Three!
Each roundtable discussion will be livestreamed on Zoom. Attend all events onsite, online, or a combination!
Webb Deane Stevens Museum | The Making of Silas Deane: May 16, Connecticut
Jay Heritage Center | John Jay, Diplomat and Spymaster: September 26, New York
Stratford Hall & Menokin | The Lee—Deane Conflict and the Political “Bloodbath” of 1778: November 8, Virginia

LECTURE | Women of the Revolution with Zara Anishanslin
2026-10-01 19:00 - 20:00 | WDS Museum, 211 Main Street, Wethersfield, CT, 06109
The Revolution wasn’t won by generals alone. In this companion lecture to the Webb Deane Stevens Museum’s exhibition Remember the Ladies: Women of the Revolution, Zara Anishanslin introduces us to the women who shaped the war for independence—from those who rallied communities and supplied armies to the enslaved women whose pursuit of freedom exposed the deepest contradictions of the new nation. These are stories of courage, resourcefulness, and influence that have waited too long to be told.
Tickets: $15 |$12.50 Virtual | $10 Members
*This lecture will be offered in person and via Zoom. Zoom link will be provided in advance of the lecture.
Zara Anishanslin | Zara Anishanslin is a historian of Early America and the Atlantic World specializing in eighteenth-century material culture. She holds a PhD from the University of Delaware and BAs in Comparative Literature and History from UNC Chapel Hill, where she was a Morehead-Cain Scholar. A former faculty member at Columbia and CUNY and Postdoctoral Fellow at Johns Hopkins, she has held fellowships from the Huntington Library, American Antiquarian Society, Winterthur Museum, the Royal Archives at Windsor Castle, and the American Philosophical Society, among others. Her first book, Portrait of a Woman in Silk (Yale University Press, 2016), won the Library Company of Philadelphia’s Biennial Book Prize. Her forthcoming The Painter’s Fire: A Forgotten History of the Artists who Championed the American Revolution (Harvard University Press, July 2025) continues her work bridging rigorous scholarship and public history — most visibly as Material Culture Consultant for Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Hamilton! The Exhibition.

LECTURE | From Variolation to Vaccination: The Transformation of Disease Prevention in the Early Republic (1796–c.1825)
2026-10-15 19:00 - 20:00 | WDS Museum, 211 Main Street, Wethersfield, CT, 06109
From Variolation to Vaccination: The Transformation of Disease Prevention in the Early Republic (1796–c.1825)
Forensic anthropologist Anna Dhody traces America’s dramatic shift from dangerous variolation to revolutionary vaccination, revealing a founding-era debate about trust, authority, and what it meant to be American that feels strikingly familiar today.
Tickets: $15 | $12.50 Virtual | $10 Members * This lecture will be offered in person and via Zoom.
Bio | Anna N. Dhody, MFS is the Founder and Executive Director of the Dhody Research Institute. She was previously the Gretchen Worden Curatorial Chair, Mütter Museum and Director, Mütter Research Institute of The College of Physicians of Philadelphia. She received her BA in archaeology from Boston University, Masters in Forensic Science from The George Washington University. A forensic anthropologist, Ms. Dhody previously served as an osteologist at Harvard University’s Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology and worked with the United Nations Development Programme and the Public Ministry of Peru to identify some of the estimated 69,000 “Desaparecidos” victims of state terrorism. Ms. Dhody is a member of the Vidocq Society, a Consulting Scholar at The University of Pennsylvania’s Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology and was appointed a Fulbright Specialist in 2023 in museum studies and physical anthropology.

FEUDING FOUNDERS COLLECTIVE | Stratford Hall & Menokin, VA: The Lee—Deane Conflict and the Political "Bloodbath" of 1778
2026-11-08 10:00 - 18:00 | Stratford Hall, 483 Great House Road, Stratford, VA, 22558
This event takes place at Stratford Hall and Menokin in Virginia. Attend the full day in person, or purchase a virtual ticket for the roundtable discussion.
Presented in partnership with Jay Heritage Center (NY), Friends of John Jay Homestead, and Menokin and Stratford Hall (VA), this series destabilizes the one-dimensional portraits we’ve inherited and invites audiences to sit with the full complexity of these lives: the ambition and the insecurity, the idealism and the grudges, the smear campaigns and the shared cause.
How did a diplomatic dispute become one of the first political media storms in American history?
Join us at Stratford Hall in Montross, VA for a Semiquincentennial conversation on the aftermath of the Lee—Deane Conflict. In 1776, Silas Deane of Connecticut was sent to France to secure crucial wartime support. He came under fire when Arthur Lee, a Virginian also posted in Europe, accused Deane of profiteering and fraud. The matter exploded into the public sphere when Deane fired back, charging Arthur Lee with spying for the British and sharing information with them. Virginia congressmen Richard Henry Lee and Francis Lightfoot Lee found themselves defending their family’s reputation amid a fierce smear campaign that played out in the pages of newspapers up and down the Eastern seaboard. John Jay, then president of Congress, was drawn into the dispute as well, with consequences that would shadow his diplomatic career for years. As accusations and defenses spilled from private correspondence into newspapers, the reputations of all four men were tested before a watching public.
This is a day for people who want to see how the Revolution unfolded not only in congresses and courts, but in print and in public opinion. Begin the morning with a tour of Menokin, Francis Lightfoot Lee’s home, before traveling to nearby Stratford Hall to walk the grounds and tour the house where the Lee brothers grew up. Share lunch and conversation, then hear from scholars representing all four partner sites—Menokin, Stratford Hall, the Webb Deane Stevens Museum, and the John Jay Historic Site—as they examine how the Deane controversy reverberated through the early republic. This Affair affected the reputations of other “feuding fathers” including Thomas Paine, Ben Franklin, and John Adams. It offers a window into the rough-and-tumble politics of the 1770s—and a reminder that the tensions between press, politics, and personal reputation are as old as the republic itself.
SCHEDULE (subject to updates)
10:00 AM-11:30 AM: Tour Menokin house and grounds, Warsaw, VA
12:00 PM-1:00 PM: Lunch at Stratford Hall, Montross VA
1:00 PM-2:30 PM: Hour long round table discussion plus Q&A on the Lee—Deane Conflict with representatives from the historic homes of John Jay (NY), Silas Deane (CT), Richard Henry Lee (VA) and Francis Lightfoot Lee (VA).
3:00-4:30 PM: Tour of Stratford Hall
5:00-6:00 PM: Wrap-up Reception and NNK Symposium Kick off, Stratford Hall
6:30-7:30 PM: Talk | NNK Symposium Keynote [add-on $10]
Pricing:
$30 | Sun, 11/8 Day Pass: Includes Menokin tour, Stratford tour, Roundtable, Reception
$10 | Add-on: NNK symposium keynote on 11/8 and NNK Symposium ticket for 11/9
$15 | Roundtable only
$5 | Virtual admission only to Roundtable
Special: $60: Pass to 11/8 Feuding Founders Symposium + Pass to 11/9 NNK Symposium
For more information or to register interest, email Connie Rosemont at crosemont@menokin.org or Hunter Peal at hunterp@stratfordhall.org

Attend All Three!
Each roundtable discussion will be livestreamed on Zoom. Attend all events onsite, online, or a combination!
Webb Deane Stevens Museum | The Making of Silas Deane: May 16, Connecticut
Jay Heritage Center | John Jay, Diplomat and Spymaster: September 26, New York
Stratford Hall & Menokin | The Lee—Deane Conflict and the Political “Bloodbath” of 1778: November 8, Virginia

About Stratford Hall
Stratford Hall brings together people from around the world to experience two-thousand acres of natural and human history, preserved and presented so that we can all learn from the courageous struggles of our ancestors, taking inspiration both from what they endured and what they accomplished. There are few places in America where people can travel down small, rural roads to arrive at a vast site that preserves so many aspects of early-American life, from the Great House where the influential Lee family helped to forge a new nation, to the fields worked by enslaved Africans, to the waters of the rivers that fueled trade, to the ground, which still yields secrets about the people and animals that lived before. Come experience this extraordinary place and learn about a layered history that began millions of years ago—a history that continues to educate, inspire, and influence Americans to the present day.
About Menokin
The Menokin Foundation uses the historic ruin of Francis Lightfoot Lee’s 18th-century home — and the surrounding built and natural environments — as a living laboratory for preservation and public engagement. Rather than recreating the past, Menokin employs contemporary methods to invite visitors into an active exploration of how America was built and what that history means today. One of the most distinctive historic sites in Virginia, Menokin reimagines what a house museum can be — and what honest, provocative engagement with our nation’s founding ideals and realities looks like on the ground.
